with Mark Khoury and Christopher Poresky

Embryonic development: how cell choreography shapes animals

Just as the collective movements of many dancers are needed to perform the choreography in a ballet, the collective behavior of many cells is required to perform the movements that shape our bodies during embryogenesis. Amazingly, the complex shapes and patterns of many animals come from a spherical, single cell embryo. Come learn about how embryos develop and the cellular dance that makes us human.

Mouse embryo (MBL/Woods Hole)

Mark Khoury

Mark Khoury

is a graduate student in Molecular and Cell biology at UC Berkeley, where he uses fruit flies to study how epithelial cells polarize during development. When he’s not taking pictures of cells or pushing flies around, Mark enjoys hiking, live theatre and staring into space while drinking coffee.

Kind of Green… but we need Somethin’ Else

For a long time, supplying electricity has been dirty but predictable: easy to orchestrate and control. Now, with high levels of clean but capricious wind and solar connected to the grid, we’ve got a lot more dynamics to manage. The old rules don’t apply and the times are a-changing. We’ve been designing a new class of nuclear reactors designed to keep the grid grooving cleanly and reliably. Come out and bring your thoughts about all things energy – we’ll discuss the birth of some other very cool applications of these new technologies, too.

Managing new energy technologies

Christopher Poresky

Christopher Poresky

is a 3rd year grad student in Per Peterson’s Thermal Hydraulics Laboratory in Berkeley’s Nuclear Engineering Department. He works on the design of an advanced nuclear plant design called the Fluoride-salt-cooled High-temperature Reactor with a focus on fault detection, cybersecurity, and human factors in a modern control room. He also helped found the Nuclear Environmental Outreach Group at Berkeley. His interests include repping New Jersey, learning to love hiking and nature, and listening to lots of music (indie rock, ska, R&B, jazz, and more).